USA law makers call Hindu Gods “false”

North Dakota Parliament opened its 2nd April 2019 session with Hindu prayers. Several Republican members of the Parliament protested the opening of the session with Hindu prayers. The Senate and House convene daily with a prayer by the chamber’s guest chaplains followed by the Pledge of Allegiance.

Lutheran pastor and freshman Rep. Jeff Hoverson of Minot stayed at the back silently protesting against the Hindu prayer.  He was joined by other reps. who returned after the prayer was over.

Lisbon Republican Rep. Sebastian Ertelt, who’s Catholic, also sat in the back during the prayer. He said Hindu prayers were not praying to the same God that I pray to.”

“I don’t want to be compelled to pray to a false god,” Hoverson said.

Jeff Hoverson wrote a letter, as published by KFGO, to Legislative Management stating that “in the preamble, we are grateful to Almighty God for our blessings. This God, was the Judeo-Christian God; as was the religion of our US Constitution.”

It seems that despite the USA teaching religious tolerance to rest of the world, North Dakota state House of Representatives. do not want the presence of any other God but Only the Christian God in their state. This is so Un-American. Is America a Christian theocracy, as Saudi Arabia is a Muslim one?

Four years ago, the Council on American-Islamic Relations was unsuccessful in wanting North Dakota House Republicans to apologize for canceling a Muslim’s opening floor session prayer on Ash Wednesday and having a Christian deliver the invocation instead.

In 2015, a Hindu woman previously gave the opening prayer, but the invocation was listed as Unitarian because she attends a Unitarian church.

In 2007,  a Hindu prayer in U.S. Senate had hecklers. A few years ago, in Idaho Senate, three Republicans walked out, during Hindu prayers with one even saying he couldn’t be in the room because Hindus “worship cows.”

Read more at

https://religionnews.com/2019/04/03/some-north-dakota-gop-lawmakers-abstain-from-hindu-prayer/

https://bismarcktribune.com/opinion/editorial/legislature-needs-to-welcome-other-faiths/article_642acdd6-25cb-5962-87df-9a80821a54f3.html

https://www.patheos.com/blogs/godzooks/2019/04/north-dakota-house-bigotry-hindu/

 

 

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